art by Jack Kamen, story by Al Feldstein
Shock SuspenStories #5 (1952)
Kind of an excessively creepy story this time around, as Jack moves into his new home and meets his new neighbour Horace. Seems Horace has a bit of a problem. He's got a great model train set-up built down in his basement, but no model trains to run on it since any time he saves up enough money to buy some his wife takes it and goes travelling.
Horace gets increasingly agitated, and Jack tries to help him, but that doesn't work. Finally, just after Jack decides to buy the trains for Horace, he and his son go over to find that Horace has bought his dream model train collection, now filled with the body parts of his chopped up wife, who Horace is happy to say will now always be doing what she loved, travelling.
I think in this one they kind of let the "ironic twist" get ahead of them, since as shrewish as she's portrayed, the wife didn't really come close to deserving what she got. Also, dragging the kid into the story, so he has to see the train filled with bloody body parts, seems a bit cruel to him.
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